And today it’s a very special cameo from no one’s favorite FW character, Jim Klabichnik, Science Guy. Hey, at least it isn’t Les. It’s a long, long way to go for a gag maybe a dozen people will see and maybe half of them will get, but then again I usually tend to vastly overstate these numbers. We also see that Westview is ALREADY in the grip of near-whiteout blizzard conditions, as there aren’t any sunny winter days in Olde Westview Towne. It’s gonna be a long winter, folks.

And this marks the end of my latest hosting stint, thanks to all for the superlative snark! Stay tuned for our resident Funk-storian, billytheskink as he guides us through whatever the hell Nate’s up to this week….enjoy!

15 responses to “Bland Control To Major Dull”

That is an insane receding hairline on that high schooler. Does Batiuk resent drawing people with hair? Or are bangs just really hard to draw?
As to what Nate is doing, I’ll be shocked if he’s not asking Cayla how Les’s latest Lisa book is going.

@TFHackett:
The art combined with the terrible, terrible humor always gives the impression that the kids are thinking “Is this guy serious?”, but given how Batiuk feels about the Kids Today I’m pretty sure he means it more as them being clueless and not appreciating comedic genius.

He does, of course, mean it to be “Today’s stupid kids don’t know a knee-slapper like that because of their being twitter tots and internuts.” This is because the world has moved on and left him behind and he resents it.

Imagine hearing this joke, and deciding to use an entire Sunday strip to feature it. Imagine hearing variations of this joke at home or trapped in the car “until he nails it.” I feel for you, Mrs. Batiuk.

TB can’t even pace a joke properly. It’s one thing to tell a joke verbally, but with several panels separating setup and punchline here, I was more focused on what was going on visually in this reality based strip. I honestly didn’t get the gag until it was pointed out here because by the time I got to the last panel I wasn’t even thinking about the earlier one mentioning “Ursa.”

These “groaner” gags go all the way back to pre-Lisa Act I, but IMO they were funnier then as the “reaction shots” were better, usually featuring a character “breaking the fourth wall” and looking out at the reader with bemused confused disgust. They worked far better in that satirical context, nowadays they’re just kind of stupid and annoying.